It’s quite normal to think that each line of code written by you is perfectly good. Unfortunately, I have to upset you – you’re wrong. Every developer makes bugs, but not all developers know how to prevent them. I think there’s no need to explain how important it is to create safe and bug-free software in payment processing. Apparently, it seems that good solutions that help to avoid bugs, seem to use the unittest framework – a module that’s available for most popular programming languages like PHP, Python, Java, C#, C++.

How does it work?

With the unittest framework, you’re able to determine whether a certain source code unit is ready to be used. A unit is the smallest part of an application that can be tested. Unit tests should be created simultaneously with the rest of an application during the development process. It’s best to write test cases which are independent and don’t affect nor are affected by other.

Advantages in unittest approach

Unittests are helpful not only when building a new application, but also during code refactoring at a later time – they make sure that the testing module still works correctly. All functions and methods should have a test case, so after running the tests, you’ll see exactly where an error occurred (if any). Errors can be fixed immediately, and tests can be run again with positive result.

Can it get even better?

You bet! To ensure that your application works correctly all the time, you can mix two methods: the unit testing approach and automatic tests. After all, tests are written, you can run them automatically every day using Cron (a time-based job scheduler in Unix operating system) and send result report directly to your mail box or via text message to your phone. Properly written tests can be almost left to themselves – they’ll run proper procedures and generate reports.

Dawid

Dawid doesn't really look like a regular programmer should. He's always smiling and eating candy, no matter whether he's coding hard, designing or supporting. One thing is for sure - if he's not by his desk, he's in the kitchen ;) But after work Dawid is sometimes a bit concious stricken, so it's quite easy to meet him jogging in the local park.